Sayōnara CP: The First Filmic Representation of the Japanese Dis/ability Rights Movement

Résumé En

This chapter examines the documentary film Sayōnara CP (1972, dir: Hara Kazuo) in order to understand visual representations of the dis/abled intent on challenging the medicalization and social devaluing of their lives. The film follows the lives of individuals with cerebral palsy who were affiliated with Aoi shiba no kai, the organization that launched the Japanese Dis/ability Rights Movement during the late 1940s. The film was a collaboration by the director and Aoi shiba no kai, yet the director represented his subjects in questionable and ableist terms. Despite its limitations, the film provided a vehicle for the protagonists to fashion self-representations that repudiated Japanese ableism and illumined the inaccessibility of the built environment. The chapter also furthers intersectional analysis by looking at the film's representation of women.